It shed enough light to illuminate the golden pumpkins in the garden and the marigolds along the path, but when it reached the edge of the forest, all became shadowed and dark. Simplia stepped out from the stoop to view the full sky.

“I think I’d rather stay here tonight,” she said.

“Me, too!” Sagacia agreed. “If we leave at dawn, we can be home for breakfast!”

Simplia turned toward the house and took one step–just one!–when a “whoosh” sounded above them. Startled, they looked up and saw the clouds shudder, and a small rectangular object came fluttering downward. Then came a cackling laugh that trailed away, or maybe it was just the crackle of dry leaves, some frightened varmint skittering over them. Sagacia reached high for the bright, lilting rectangle, which soon revealed itself to be an envelope, and when an unexpected zephyr lifted it just out of her grasp, Simplia followed it a few steps and reached for it again.

“Got it!” she said.

Back inside, Sagacia lit the oil lamp and sat in a side chair. Murzik jumped into her lap and listened with her as Simplia read aloud.

Dear Vasilisa the Wise,

Last year a storyteller came to my children’s school and told a story about you and a witch to my daughter’s fifth grade class and then told “Hansel and Gretel” to my son’s fourth grade class. My children told me the stories were scary, and they had trouble getting to sleep that night.

Naturally, I called the principal the next morning and asked if he knew that stories about witches were being told in his school. He said he’d dropped by the library, and, though he missed any witch stories, it was clear to him that the children were fully engaged, and their minds were going 90 to nothing. (Right! And about what!!? Witches and other devilish thoughts!) In the end, he said he was going to just “sit” on it. That’s all he ever does: just sit! And he’s still sitting, I guess. Now I hear they are going to hire the same storyteller again this year, and he even knows about it and has approved!

Honestly, Vasilisa! Our children are assaulted by evil every day, and they don’t need their schools to actually hire people to come in and regale them with stories about more wicked, Godless creatures! I’m not against stories or storytelling at all, but there are plenty of good stories around, so why do storytellers have to pick the ones with witches in them?

Faithful in Fairbanks

No further words were uttered, but Murzik heard two small sighs. The Simpletons looked at one another transmitting a hope that some of their magical friends might have stirring words of advice or perhaps powerful shaming censure for one “Faithful in Fairbanks.”

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About mary grace ketner

My lawyer tells me I should not put the words "Fairy Tale Lobbyist" on my business cards but rather "Representative" and "National Fairy Tale Association." But I'm not, and there isn't one. Even so, I don't think I'm going it alone.

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10 thoughts on “A waning gibbous moon…”

I have this problem here in the land of Dorothy, a.k.a. Kansas. My puppet Trixie came with a black pointy hat, but I changed it for a leopard print. She’s not a witch, just old (111 years, to be exact). The kids aren’t afraid of witches here, but the adults are.

And don’t even start on devil stories! I’ve got a program called “School Inappropriate Stories,” which nobody has ever booked, that has a story about some devils and a fart. I think if I told that story at a school, I’d never be hired back. The kids would love it, though.

When I was a librarian, we had a patron who didn’t want her children to hear talking animal stories, and another patron who was Wiccan and objected to the witch books because they were portrayed badly. Just can’t please everybody…

There is a serious economic issue, though, isn’t there? If I want to be hired around this prong on the Bible belt, I can’t be known as the storyteller who tells witch stories. I do want to be hired, because I like to eat and pay my mortgage. Good thing there are lots of stories out there to tell, many of which don’t include a witch (or ghost or dead man or devil).

Sigh. Scary stories and stories about witches, devils and other dark creatures are a staple of childhood and are beneficial in the long run. They often teach valuable moral lessons and tell children that goodness can triumph over evil. The funny thing about receiving such a letter from someone called “Faithful in Fairbanks” is that these stories originally were told by many faithful, God-fearing folks. It’s just that modern people have become over-sensitized to things.

Really? We’re having this discussion in the world of “Twilight” (vampires), “Harry Potter” (aren’t they witches?), and other movies and books? Witches, monsters, vampires, werewolves – all represent the evil that actually does exist in our world. However, in most stories about witches – the witches lose after a fight with the good or outsmarted by the wise. Even “Wizard of Oz” has this fight. Evil must be discussed because it exists, and it can be overcome, one battle of goodness at a time, and that’s what a Storyteller brings.

Around here it seems that those who complain are People Of The Word. Indeed, I can tell these stories by simply saying “wise woman” or “granny lady.” Without the troublesome WORD, they don’t seem to recognize the motif.
Same with the “g” word which comes up so often in October.

I don’t use the word, either, just because it has acquired a rather stiff, plastic meaning, but I’ve had a similar thing happen once when telling a “spooky” story around October 31. Everything was okay until I said the word “Halloween,” then the teacher interrupted to tell me that this was “a Christian school, and we don’t do Halloween.” Nothing wrong with the story, just the word!

This case was so weird, Adam! It was a few minutes into the story in a *public* library to which this teacher had brought her private school class, and they made up the majority of the listeners at the event. The word added nothing to the story; I just said it to tie in to the season we were in. I’d never had cause to wonder about the simple word “Halloween” before or since. (But then, I’ve never told in a “Christian” school before or since, either.)

That story, “The Tinker and the Ghost,” is also an example of your previous comment about faithful, God-fearing people creating these stories, for toward the end of it, the ghost asks the protagonist to help him pay for his (the ghost’s) sins by returning stolen money so that he (the ghost) may ascend into heaven, which the protagonist does. Though I always tell that part, I often wonder why no one has challenged me on it.

IT HAPPENS EVERY MONTH!

Someone in distress over a Fairy Tale theme or problem writes for help from Vasilisa the Wise via her syndicated newspaper column. But Vasilisa--well, she's stuck in a little hut on chicken feet until she finishes picking out the dirt from poppy seeds, or at the widow’s house in town, spinning flax into linen to make a shirt for the czar, or she’s at a banquet making swans come out of her sleeve. She just can't attend to questions right now, so she enlists the aid of her two simpleton friends who feed the cat and collect her mail. They can’t really help, either. Not by themselves.

Fortunately, they know others who can! Magical friends like you, who care about fairy tales and storytelling, who have accumulated experience, observations, and ponderings to share, and who might take a moment to post a response to help a correspondent solve a conundrum.

On the magical third day of each month, Vasilisa's mail magically appears, the Simpletons open it (with permission), read the question and ask for help answering it. Then they gather responses, yours and others', and distribute them every week or so to inspire further thought. As if by magic, when the third of the next month rolls in, so does another question! Here’s what the Simpletons hope you’ll do: Read the question then (a) post your response as a comment on the blog itself, (b) reply to it on the Storytell Listserv, or (c) write in your answer on The Fairy Tale Lobby Facebook page.

The Fairy Tale Lobby is a "Discussion Group" of the National Storytelling Network, and this blog is both the way we discuss fairy tale topics and a means of preserving your wisdom. Regardless of whether or not you are a member of NSN, if you value fairy tales, if you defend them in the real world, if you advocate their greater use, if you occasionally even lobby on their behalf, you will feel right at home here.

Your hosts at the Fairy Tale Lobby, besides Simplia and Sagacia who carry out all the communications, fluff the pillows on the Chesterfield, brew the tea, butter the gate, and bake the crumpets, are Megan Hicks and Mary Grace Ketner. They are the ones who enjoy and appreciate your ideas insights most of all.

This month’s question:

Dear Vasilisa the Wise --

Are you really as good as all that? Are you really wise? Or just cagey? When you're wearing your Czarina hat, are you genuinely concerned about the well-being of your subjects? Or do you just want to pacifying them enough that they don't foment unrest? In your stories, as an innocent, you're too good to be true. I'm pretty unschooled in fairy tales, so I wonder if there are many stories about you as an woman married to the Czar.

Usually the people at the top of the heap are there either as innocuous place holders or as the source of the conflict that winds the story up. Bad rulers are deposed in fairy tales. Do their usurpers then become the next wave of bad rulers?

Right now, I could use a story about a good monarch. A wise queen. A generous rich man. An honest advisor to the king. Not just a placeholder in the story. Not just a cameo role. I'm looking for a prime mover. Help me out here, would you? I'm growing

Cynical in Cynghordy

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